


Though He Said He Would be Mine

by vamm_goda



Series: Money From the Government [2]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Escorts, Alternate Universe - Not Hockey Players, Colorado Avalanche, Hooker AU, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-12
Updated: 2015-07-12
Packaged: 2018-04-09 00:53:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4327650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vamm_goda/pseuds/vamm_goda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one thing Gabe can’t seem to shake is how he started this whole escort thing because he wanted something easy.</p><p>The irony . . . does not escape him.<br/>(Set in the 2012-13 season)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Though He Said He Would be Mine

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'd, because my exact line of thought went something like this:  
> "Holy shit, I'm writing things! Post before they go away again!"
> 
> Based on a prompt for Offseason Match, which stuck in my head and wouldn't let go. Loosely set in the same universe as Money from the Government, though there's no crossovers between characters and each can be read independently. Title again from Amanda Palmer's "Blake Says".
> 
> Warnings for:  
> Mildly dubious consent  
> Sex work  
> Ridiculously optimistic ending  
> Ending can be read as involving an open relationship

****

But trust me, he's no valentine

Though he said he would be mine

\- Amanda Palmer (Blake Says)

\\\

Gabe’s not sure why his hands are shaking.

Objectively it’s easy. Just pick up the phone, thumb the numbers in, call. Easy. It’s not like taking a faceoff or scoring in sudden death. It’s _easy_. He’ll call, and Wolz will answer, and in an hour Beau will be knocking at his door with a crooked smile and low slung jeans, the curve of his hipbone begging to be bitten. It’s all exactly what Gabe wants, but for some reason reaching out and getting it has him knotted up inside.

It’s not the money, because it’s a drop in the bucket considering his contract. There’s really nothing in the world that he could blow all of that on, unless he wanted to ride in a spaceship a couple dozen times or something, so this one little vice isn’t worth sweating over.

It’s . . . it’s not the money, he knows that.

He stills his hands after some deep breaths, dials Wolz and makes his appointment. He likes the word appointment; it feels safe, like a doctor.

Gabe showers, brushes his teeth, cracks a beer and drinks half of it before 5:30. By the time Beau buzzes the door he’s on his second, and feeling marginally more prepared.

Beau’s got that little smirk on his face, the one that looks like perfect confidence, the one Gabe wants to kiss off his face almost as badly as he wants to learn how to mimic it. Instead he leans in and presses his lips to Beau’s neck, breathing in.

Beau relaxes into his body with a low sound of relief, letting Gabe pull him in with hands fisted in the soft material of his t-shirt. His hands come up instantly to cup Gabe’s head, thumbs rubbing at the soft spot behind his ears, the place that makes him a little crazy with lust and want. He’s already feeling dizzy with it, which is just further proof of how far off the deep end he’s gone. He can call for Beau, who’s honestly not that much older than him, and he can give into it and sink into him and just _release_ for a few precious hours. He can stretch Beau out and fuck into him until they’re both trembling with the need to come, and then he can do it again an hour later because they’re both young.

They end up having sex there on the couch, wound up and too needy to wait for anything else, Beau on his knees in the carpet with his face buried in Gabe’s lap, taking him down impossibly deep while he gets himself off with his free hand. Gabe can just clutch at the cushions and gasp, struggle to remember English because it’s just _so much_ , and when Beau presses his fingers inside Gabe and fingers him to insanity it’s all Gabe can do to not collapse against the cushions and just _die_ , right there.

He’s still shaking through the lingering shocks of orgasm when Beau tucks him into his pants, pressing a kiss to the blade of his hip. That’s new, and Gabe would arch an eyebrow at that if his face wasn’t still stuck in ‘O’ mode.

Beau gets back to his feet and comes back with a couple beers, passing one to Gabe with a little smirk, and cracks his open. The line of his throat is glossy with sweat, long and strong, and Gabe watches him drink because that’s kinda nice.

“Thanks, Sunshine,” he says once he’s found his voice, and Beau makes the most petulant face at him.

“Don’t call me that, jeeze.” Beau takes a thick drink, licks at his lips. His fingers tangle into Gabe’s hair, longer this season and getting rough, petting at his scalp. Gabe’s eyes drift closed. “Anyways, you’re sunshineier than me.”

Gabe laughs at that, leans forward to tweak the sharp point of one nipple, poking against his shirt. “I don’t have a golden glow.”

Beau looks a little shocked. “It’s a sunburn, from when I went home,” he says, a little out of nowhere.

He presses his beer against the plane of Beau’s belly, watching the way Beau contracts and jumps away before he forces himself to relax. “Better?”

“ _Fucker_.” It’s a rarity for Beau to curse, and it has Gabe grinning like he just won some sort of award. And then Beau’s laughing and they end up trading stories and drinks until the time is up, and then Beau throws his jacket on and heads out, tossing a casual wave over his shoulder. The shy way he smiles should seem disingenuous, considering, but instead it just seems genuinely _real_ in a way Gabe clutches to himself when Beau’s not looking.

Gabe wears the C, there’s nothing low profile about his life, and the fact he can get away with this gives him that rush that makes the sex a little bit better than it already is. It’s a risk, it’s a _challenge_ , and maybe he enjoys the helpless desperation of it. Maybe it’s a nice break from being _that guy_ , the one on the ice and in the dressing room who has all of the answers, who’s always on.

\\\

The one thing Gabe can’t seem to shake is how he started this whole thing because he wanted something _easy_.

The irony . . . does not escape him.

\\\

They met basically by accident, when Gabe was new to town and alone, his family long gone home and not quite settled enough to call Denver the same. Some of the guys introduced him to Wolz, gregarious and almost offensively friendly, who talked to Gabe and must have recognized . . . something. Some sort of absence or loneliness.

He’s never determined _how_ Paul and Wolz are connected, maybe something from their past or Europe or maybe something else, something more visceral. He’s never asked Paul, because Paul has never asked about Beau. Sometimes it feels like a pact of mutually assured destruction.

All he can say for sure is that Wolz knows Paul, and so he meets Gabe, and in a day Wolz introduces Gabe and Beau and that’s the start of it.

Gabe sorta wants to hate Wolz for complicating his life but he just _can’t_.

It happens subtly enough to be an accident, which is a beautiful thing for plausible deniability if it goes south, meeting somewhere safe and above all _neutral_. Gabe’s not really that into immediate infatuation but Beau was open and sincere and interesting, and it moved easily enough from conversations and touches to more, Beau with his teeth pressed into Gabe’s forearm while they fucked in the hotel, Gabe thrusting up and in and yes, more _please_ as Beau arched against him, begging in a breathless voice that Gabe couldn’t get out of his head for days afterward. He’d look down at the bruises on his forearm and see Beau’s mouth there, curled around the curve of his flexor and giving him all of these _thoughts_ about that mouth; he knew he had to call again. And again.

It was never like he didn’t know what he was getting in to, because he did. There’s a rush in being able to call whenever he wants and know Beau will be there, smile on his face and an easy cockiness to his hip. That arrogance lasts a few seconds until Gabe has him joking and fucking _giggling_ , blushing in a way that’s hard to read as anything but adorable and sincere.

It gets easier to call, after a while. More natural. Gabe isn’t sure if that’s good or bad.

\\\

That first year, when Gabe’s billeted and everything has to happen in a hotel room, it’s easy to keep it separate. It’s like there’s a line between “This is what Gabe does at home” and “this is what Gabe does away from home” and it rests right outside his front door.

When Milan passes him the C with a weary shrug and sad eyes Gabe’s suddenly _captain_ , he’s barely gotten his feet wet in the NHL and now he’s got a team that depends on him. So he lives with EJ for a while then attempts to be an adult and buys a place of his own, calls Beau up because he has his own honest to god place now and because he can.

They have sex on every surface that can support them, and a few that turn precarious after the first round, and suddenly he has all these _memories_ of Beau in his house, places where he’ll look and remember why the brand-new dining table squeaks or what the marble counter feels like against bare skin.

In retrospect getting his own place might actually have been worse than the alternative, because now he sees Beau _everywhere he looks_.

\\\

Wins are great, they’re _amazing_ , and Gabe can’t skip team dinners, especially since he and his shiny new letter pick up the tab — captain’s privilege. Dutchy sneaks him a couple beers that he tries not to slam down, but Gabe’s hyped on the win and he just wants to _go_. The adrenaline is thick in his veins, and when they close down the bar he calls Wolz from the privacy of his car, heart high in his throat.

Wolz has never said no to him but Gabe still feels like he has to ask since it’s polite, or something. And Wolz agrees, because of course he does, and even though it’s past 3 in the morning Beau still shows up at Gabe’s door with a bright smile and missing the creases of a pillow on his cheek. Gabe can’t swear that Beau even sleeps, he’s never seen it happen and it doesn’t seem to matter what time of the day or night he makes the call.

Beau’s outside his door when he walks up, fiddling with his phone. When Gabe gets closer he hears the sounds of Angry Birds.

“Hey.” He’s trying not to grin, but then Beau gives him that sunny smile and he starts fucking _beaming_. “Sorry about the wait.”

“I just got here,” Beau shrugs, tucking his phone into his hip pocket. It’s hard to be sure if he’s telling him the truth or being polite, but he’s still in his coat so it could go either way. “Won’t say no to going inside, though. It’s cold.”

“I’m hurrying,” Gabe grumbles, digging his keys out of his pocket. “And it’s really not.”

“You just come from the frosty ass of the world.”

Gabe shrugs it off, a misconception he’s heard too many times for the joke to land. “It’s beautiful. You really should see it some time.” Beau hovers a fraction too close, maybe not too close for America but certainly too close for Gabe, who grew up with different ideas of personal space. He feels like an incoming check against Gabe’s back, closing and looming and _dangerous_ , and Gabe barely has the door open before Beau is further in his space, backing him against the wall and kissing at his neck.

There’s a rush to it; maybe Gabe’s tired, or Beau is, but there’s no time lost to teasing or taunting. Beau edges Gabe through the door with his body, cock fitting against the arch of Gabe’s ass, rutting into him while his hand skims Gabe’s belly, dipping into his slacks to pull Gabe against him. The after game adrenaline is still running helter skelter through him, making his skin hyper sensitive to the contact. It’s not exactly how he wanted it, but it’s how he needs it, quick and frantic while the high of winning is still there, celebrating it the way he can share with Beau.

They end up in a mad tangle on the bed, Beau working him open with fingers and tongue until Gabe’s cursing incoherently into his pillow in three languages, arching up to meet him and all but begging. Beau takes his sweet time, taking Gabe apart over and over, fucking into him slow and steady until his orgasm hits him like a punch to the gut, vision sparking at the edges.

“It was a good game tonight,” Beau mumbles, once his breath is back, fingers playing with the come on Gabe’s belly. “Nice goal.”

“It was okay,” he says after a second, and he’s pretty sure he can’t come again but he coaxes Beau’s hand lower, because he might as well find . . .

 _Oh_.

That’s . . . a little worrying, actually.

Beau laughs and leans up to kiss the side of Gabe’s neck, lips skimming the line of muscle there. “Don’t worry about it, okay? It’s not a big deal. I’m just sick of not telling you that, since I watch all the games.”

It feels like a big deal, like a _huge fucking deal_ , but Beau just keeps kissing over his back, soothing the muscles that not even sports massage can get fully unwound, tongue tracing the cut of them across his shoulders.

“Okay,” he says, because he can’t think of anything else to say.

“I don’t watch them because of you, promise. I just like hockey, and. Not a lot of Viking superstars in town is what I’m saying,” Beau offers, sprawling on his back. “And I like Stastny better, anyway.”

Gabe starts laughing, and he’s going to kill Beau for that comment. Just . . . not right now. He rolls over to get a look at Beau, sleepiness making his expression shy. “I think I should be insulted.”

Beau nods earnestly, propped up on his elbow. “You really should be.”

Gabe gets him pinned on a sneaky little feign.

\\\

Sometimes, after that day, Beau lays on Gabe’s chest and traces a C into the sweat on his skin. Sometimes Beau talks, about how he used to play hockey, about how he loved it more than the world.

Gabe never works up the courage to ask him why it’s always in the past tense.

\\\

Beau doesn’t make a big deal about knowing who Gabe is _really_ , so Gabe tries not to admit that it’s a thing he thinks about from time to time, a new and different level of intimacy between them. There’s a lot about this thing they have that he doesn’t understand, and there’s a lot that he most likely doesn’t want to know, so he mostly just tries to chalk it up as ‘don’t screw up a sexy thing’.

Probably he should be more concerned than he is about the fact that Beau _knows_ , apparently watches him sometimes. But he’s kept his silence about that, so Gabe can’t really find it in himself to worry about it. He’s sure Beau has a list, a black book or something, and he’s never said anything about anyone or anything before, so he’s pretty secure in thinking Beau won’t do it to him, either.

He _trusts_ Beau. He trusts himself to never put Beau in a place where he’ll need to use that info.

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t also start to google things, things about guys named Beau who have nice suntans and used to play hockey. Because Gabe’s nothing if not curious.

“Hey, Thor.” Beau pats his shoulder as he walks in, and Gabe looks down at his hand for a moment before his brow furrows.

“ _Thor_?”

“Hey, if I get Sunshine . . .” Beau spreads his hands almost helplessly, expression somewhere between ‘shark’ and ‘just pissed the rug’.

Gabe’s laughing even as he strips his shirt over his head, enjoying the way Beau makes a desperate little noise and leans in to press his palms against Gabe’s belly when they come back together. “What was that about ‘Thor’?”

Beau is obviously appreciative. “Just keep on proving me right, Thor. I can take it.”

Beau’s taking it quick, crowding back against him, hands falling to the waist of Gabe’s jeans like he’s got some sort of challenge riding on this, on how quick he can get them both naked and panting. It’s not bad, not exactly, because Gabe is all sorts of on board with getting to the fun parts quickly, but it _is_ a little off putting, a little aggressive and _impersonal_. Gabe’s not really sure how he can say that about someone who’s grinding his palm against the bulge in his jeans, but it’s true. He’s not sure he likes it, and he pulls away to rest his forehead against Beau’s, fingers tangling in his hair.

“It’s not a race,” he mumbles, even as Beau rolls their hips together, looking for friction. He can _feel_ his eyes roll up, and his voice comes out as a half choked growl. “ _Fuck_. You . . . you got a meeting you need to get to or something after this?”

It’s probably not classy to ask his escort that, but in Gabe’s defense he’s kinda started to forget that’s what Beau is, even if his bank account keeps reminding him. It’s stupid of him to forget something as objectively important as that and he’s pulled out of whatever funny illusions he’s had when Beau’s whole body goes tight, just for a second. He wouldn’t even notice except they’re _so close_ , and it’s impossible to hide that when up until a few seconds ago he was enthusiastically riding Gabe’s thigh.

He hates his big mouth, _so much_.

“I. Uh.”

And for a moment it’s _Beau_ who’s got everything together, who gives Gabe a little smile and pulls away, palms pressed flat to Gabe’s belly. “It’s okay. We’ve still got time, if you want . . .”

He can’t think of very many things he wants to do less than this, because the thought of Beau sucking him off, maybe letting Gabe fuck him before dressing and going out to meet someone else with the hitch in his step that Gabe gave him, that’s not what he’s into _at all_.

Beau sees something there, a reluctance in his face that he reads as easily as Gabe can read a play, and the tightness in his shoulders has Gabe’s throat seizing up just a little.

“You called a little late, but I really wanted to see you . . .” He shrugs, and the expression on his face is the closest to pain that Gabe’s ever seen.

He doesn’t really like this side of Beau. “Yeah, it. It’s okay.”

“It’s kinda not, but thanks for lying.” He leans up, nuzzling to Gabe’s throat, “listen, why don’t we —”

“—Another time, yeah?”

Beau looks hurt and he pulls away from Gabe to give them both space, give them room to maneuver and pretend again, only Gabe’s too tired to really bother with it today. Any day. Mostly today. “Yeah, sure. Of course.”

Beau goes into the living room, gathers up his coat and throws it over his arm before coming back.

Gabe doesn’t want that.

For once what Gabe wants has no bearing on this _thing_.

Beau cups his cheek, resting his forehead against Gabe’s, sharing his air for a moment. “I’ll see you soon.”

Neither one of them are sure what exactly Beau means by that, but Gabe gives him a smile. “Yeah, soon.” And then Beau heads out, tossing his coat on as he goes.

There’s a business card on the coffee table, right in the place where Beau had sprawled out that first time, legs canted invitingly, when they had christened Gabe’s apartment in a rush of sex and possession.

It’s Wolz’s card, the one Gabe already has, and he flips it over to see Beau’s rough scrawl across the back, a number without a name, written out like a promise.

 _Call me_ it seems to say.

Gabe imports the number into his phone, then tosses the card on his way to the bedroom.

\\\

He holds off on using the number for a couple months. Not out of any contrariness, or petty meanness. The season is a rapid downhill slide, there’s injuries and apathy, and it’s all Gabe can do to keep control in the dressing room, he has zero time to spend trying to figure out his personal life. His head and his heart are in that room with his struggling team, trying desperately to hold on to them. That’s his first priority, always, and he has to keep their heads above water even though he’s drowning.

Needless to say it’s not how he imagined his first year of captaincy going.

In the end it’s Jiggy who saves them, who jumps head first into the deep end and throttles some sense into the room, throws out a life raft built out of frustration and fury and leaves it there for everyone who wants to climb aboard. Jiggy takes the helm, says the hard things that no one else is saying, calls them on their shit. Gabe lets him, taking the reprieve to gasp air back into his lungs.

Jiggy’s kinda his hero in that moment, because Gabe was too close to going down with his ship.

It doesn’t solve everything, not by a long shot, but it gives the team a solid shock, shakes them to the core and then reboots them for something better.

They’re too far gone to salvage the season, but they can play what’s left of it with their heads up as long as they just remember who they are.

It’s after a win against Calgary that Gabe picks up the phone, dials the number Beau gave him and waits.

“Hello?” Beau sounds hesitant on the other end, a little shy even, and Gabe has to clear his throat before he can squeeze out “Hi, Sunshine,” because suddenly his mouth isn’t working right.

The heavy silence falls away immediately; he can almost see Beau’s grin. “Hey! You had me worried, Thor.”

“Yeah, well. It’s been kinda crazy in Avalanche zone.”

“That’s what I meant.” There’s a pause, almost like sympathy. “You’re doing better, though.”

Gabe’s rueful; it’s _never enough_. “Yeah, _better_.”

Beau laughs, thick and rich in his throat. “Better enough to have you finally calling me back. I was getting worried; I don’t normally give this number out, y’know.”

Gabe suspected as much, and that’s why it comes out like gratitude instead of surprise when he murmurs, “yeah, really?”

They talk. It’s just that, easy banter and companionship, and the innuendo is thick but it’s not _important_ , it’s just a basic thing that bounces between them, mingled with jokes and everything else.

There’s some part of Gabe that feels safe telling Beau everything; about how the dressing room just spiraled after a while, the resignation that settled in the very bones of the team until each loss was _just another one_ , shrugged off and dismissed. How he had seen the team slipping through his fingers and been all but powerless to stop them. It’s embarrassing, not that Jiggy stepped up but that he needed to at all. Sakic would never have let the room slide that far down, and he can’t judge himself next to _Joe Sakic_ but he does anyway, because everyone else already is.

Beau listens, and somewhere around the time Gabe starts throwing Sakic’s name around he sighs. “Okay. I’m coming over.”

Gabe stills. Beau’s never invited himself over before — it’s probably some sort of breech of the escort/client relationship — but he’s tired and heart sore and Beau on his doorstep sounds like exactly the sort of thing he needs at that moment.

“Please,” he murmurs, hating how hesitant his voice sounds.

Beau’s there in less than an hour, tapping on his door and then tapping again, louder, when Gabe’s not there to open up right away. He crowds Gabe immediately, and it’s _too much_ after everything, but all he does is press a quick kiss to Gabe’s forehead before steering him to the couch and shoving him down bodily.

Gabe flops onto the cushions with a surprised sound, followed by an exhalation of discomfort when Beau drops a shopping bag on his belly, the glasses inside clinking against each other as they settle across his body.

“Figured you’d need it,” is all the explanation he gets before Beau cracks open a couple bottles, passing them over and letting Gabe drink.

He’s halfway through the first before he remembers to say ‘thanks’, and he’s done with the second before he finally gives in and leans against Beau, pressing his face into his neck and just breathing.

It feels like the first time he’s caught his breath in a long while, leaning against Beau and letting his guard down for those handfuls of seconds before he sits up, pulls in another shaky breath and offers Beau a crooked smile.

“Better?” Beau asks, all sweet sincerity.

“Not really.”

Beau sighs and cracks open another bottle, tossing his coat in the general direction of the closet. By the fourth Gabe’s limbering up, and Beau puts him to bed before he can finish the sixth, tucking himself against Gabe’s back and slinging an arm over him, situating himself between Gabe and the bedroom door.

“I used to play hockey, y’know. Until I fucked up my foot, couldn’t skate at a high level after that. Dropped out of college since it cost me my scholarship.” There’s a scar on Beau’s leg that matches his words, and Gabe dozes off listening to Beau ramble soft secrets to him.

Gabe’s pretty sure it’s a combination of beer and exhaustion that makes him feel like Beau’s pressing a kiss to the back of his neck, because kissing’s not something they do. It’s something he wouldn’t even think to notice except it’s the _first_ , and it seems weirdly important despite everything else they’ve done.

Gabe wakes up a little hung over and a lot better with Beau’s breath against his nape in sleepy puffs. His body is hot against Gabe’s back, arm heavy across his chest, and Gabe leans back against him for a few minutes, hooking his ankle over Beau’s calf.

When Gabe finally rolls out of bed Beau makes a protesting sound and nuzzles into the blankets, building a little Beau nest in the middle of the bed for himself.

Which seems unfair when Gabe’s the one nursing a mild hangover, but whatever.

Beau’s gone when he finishes with his shower and without him there Gabe is having a hard time believing that last night happened at all, that Beau was there when he needed him and then gone when he didn’t. If it wasn’t for the presence of beer that he didn’t buy sitting on the coffee table he’d think that maybe he snapped, had some sort of hallucination of comfort that was all his brain could think of to coax him back to sleep.

He peels off one of the labels while his oatmeal is cooking, lays the label flat on the counter and leaves it there. It’s like some sort of reminder, he thinks.

\\\

The thing he likes about this, about the play between them, is how good Beau is about giving him attention. Gabe never has to beg or wheedle for it, if Beau is there then Gabe has his attention, completely.

Something about that soothes the middle child inside him.

\\\

There’s no easy fix for a team on the downhill slide, just a slow attempt at trying to be something other than a writer’s lazy punch line. Gabe has to shoulder the weight of it because the slide happened on his watch. He’s pretty sure that’s what a captain is supposed to do; Kitchener prepared him for aspects of this, but not all of it. Not the sheer size of an NHL organization. Not for the way his heart shakes every time he catches a headline, hears Sacco’s voice barking at him in the dressing room.

After that first time Beau comes over about once a week. He comes on his own; Gabe only calls him when it rolls around to Thursday and he hasn’t heard from him. That doesn’t happen except once, otherwise Beau is over with beer to watch a game or drink or make out.

Kissing Beau feels so damn awesome Gabe’s not sure how he was able to hold back from doing it before. Beau’s soft and demanding all at once, pulling him in with sharp nips and then melting into him entirely, sucking on his tongue and moaning into his mouth. Beau is 100% _his_ when they kiss, and it’s addictive.

Beau sleeps in his bed, steals his toothpaste, builds a sofa fort and sniffles at him miserably when he catches a summer cold. Coming home to Beau is one of the only decent things to come out of that season, because they end up so far out of the playoff race that they’d need a telescope to see the Cup and that is _not_ what Gabe started playing hockey for.

“You’ll get there,” Beau mumbles, nose red and eyes watering and so far from sexy that he somehow cycles right around and gives Gabe guilt for thinking erotic thoughts about a sick guy. “It fucking sucks right now, but you’ll do anything to keep it from sucking this bad again, right?”

He . . . has a point. Gabe doesn’t want to kiss him and risk coming down with the flu so he settles for ruffling Beau’s hair until he wriggles his arms out of his blanket nest to swat at him.

The season ends on a sour note that sticks in his throat, has him packing up his locker and casting sad glances around the room, wondering who won’t be there when the new season rolls around. Fair bet Gabe will be back, but he pockets his name plate just in case.

Just. Just in case.

Most of the guys ship out pretty soon after the end of the season. Vegas trips were called off for obvious reasons and pretty soon Gabe is all that’s left in town. Gabe, and the permanent residents. It’s not like he doesn’t want to go home, because he misses his mom’s cooking and Beatrice has started sending him some very sarcastic texts but the thought of slipping away from Beau, of leaving without knowing what he’ll come back to, sticks in his throat a little.

“Oh, shut up,” Beau mumbles when Gabe brings it up, other teams well into the post season. “I’m not going anywhere, you big baby.”

“Shut up,” he grumbles, because that’s far from a guarantee of anything.

Beau elbows him, gets off the couch and comes back with a box of tissues that he leaves at Gabe’s elbow. “Waaaah.”

Gabe nails him in the back of the head with the box when he goes to leave, and he doesn’t stop laughing for fifteen minutes after that.

\\\

“It’s just.” Gabe’s working on chopping, and Beau has the chicken breaded and ready to bake. “It’s just that sometimes I worry I’m not what the team needs.” It’s about being the first of a new generation to carry _Joe’s legacy_ , more than anything.

Beau finishes lining the meat out on the tray, pushing past Gabe to wash his hands. “From what you say Sacco was an ass, but Roy’s letting you keep the C, right? And that has to mean something.”

Patrick Roy just came on board a few days ago, and a lot of things have changed but Gabe’s status hasn’t budged.

Patrick Roy . . . is not an ass.

“Fair point,” he admits grudgingly, kisses Beau slow and sweet until the oven beeps and they have to break apart to get dinner cooking.

“I have lots of fair points,” Beau offers with a wink.

\\\

At some point Beau kinda . . . moves in. Gabe’s not really sure how it happened, because a lot of his summer is taken up with family and training and _playing wing with Forsberg and Naslund_ , but sometime between leaving for home and coming back for training camp Beau shows up at his place to welcome him and doesn’t leave.

Gabe’s at a loss to explain a lot of things about their relationship, everything from _what does this mean_? all the way up to _when did this become a relationship?_ It’s hard to be bothered by it, especially when Beau greets him at the door with ice packs and a ready smile, rides Gabe on the sofa and then fusses at him about keeping his sprains elevated.

It’s just strange, it seems like he should have notice at some point, but Gabe is gradually coming to the realization that when it comes to Beau he misses an awful lot.

“Paul called earlier,” Beau offers, hairline still dark with sex-sweat and poking skeptically at the meat he’s grilling. “Said the guys were going out for some drinks after the last day of camp. You game?”

Gabe’s not sure how Beau’s forming coherent sentences, let alone _cooking dinner_ because he is still fizzily orgasmic, but maybe that’s a side effect of what Beau does for a living.

Not that he seems to be doing . . . that . . . very much anymore. Sometimes he’ll meet Gabe at the door to the building after practice, like he’s also been gone, but when Gabe’s home Beau’s home.

He’s also a little unsure when Beau ended up with a key to his place. That seems like something he should look into at some point.

Beau’s looking at Gabe like he said something important, and Gabe has to force himself to think about the previous words Beau had said. “That’s nice?” he decides finally.

He grins a little, ducks his head in a way that makes heat settle in Gabe’s belly, and laughs. “That’s not _exactly_ the right response.”

“Sue me Sunshine, you give amazing head.” After a moment of hesitation he hops onto the counter, leaning down to kiss Beau.

That earns him a swat to the knee from the flipper Beau’s holding. “Counters are for glasses, not asses.” He gives Gabe another peck, then pokes at the chicken experimentally. “You want to get some drinks with the guys after camp?”

Gabe ponders that for a moment. “Sounds good to me.”

Which is how they end up at a bar later that week, Beau freshly scrubbed and grinning, bullshitting with Paul about the Pioneers’ record this season, their chance of making off with the Golden Pan, flashing huge eyes at Dutchy and just generally being a charming SOB.

So, now Beau is hanging out with his team. That’s . . . new.

If Paul has picked up on anything he tactfully keeps his mouth closed on it, friendly and open just like the rest of them, who seem to have taken a particular liking to Beau.

“Your friends are our friends,” EJ mumbles easily when Gabe corners him. “He’s cool.”

That seems to be the general consensus between all of them, that Beau is good people, and he sinks into the group with an effortlessness that confirms to Gabe that Beau was a fair way up the hockey food chain before he’d decided to sit it out (or been sidelined, Gabe’s never gotten the full story on that). _No one_ adapts that easily to the crush of a hockey team without some previous experience, no matter how heroically unimpressed Beau has been about Gabe’s life so far.

“He’s from California,” Paul offers casually, slipping Gabe a beer. “That’s why he absorbs the sun like it’s going out of style.”

Gabe should probably be insulted that Paul is divulging information about his . . . escort? Boyfriend? He’s a little fuzzy on the proper linguistic term for Beau.

He hedges his bets with, “he doesn’t talk about it.”

Paul nods, leaning against the bar so he can scan the room. Paul’s a watcher; it’s something Gabe’s always kinda admired about him on the ice, the way he can keep his eyes everywhere at once, seeing every possible opportunity. “Wolz and I, we’ve known each other a long time. He’s an old teammate; has a habit of picking up other ex-players.”

“And turning them into hookers?”

“This isn’t all he does.” This is the first time in their conversation Paul sounds irritated, drinking his beer and looking outwardly cool-as-you-please.

There’s a story there, and Gabe is gonna get it one of these days; he focuses on the important part of the conversation instead. “Beau’s one of them?”

“You should ask.” Paul jerks his head out to one of the tables they’ve commandeered, Beau taking a shot with Varly. He laughs, slamming his glass onto the table, easy as pie. Beau’s bright and clear, people are noticing him even surrounded by guys like Matt and Gabe, and Gabe’s surprisingly okay with that. Because Beau’s eyes seek him out across the room, and when he takes another shot he doesn’t look away from Gabe, holds it while he licks his lips and sets the glass down. In the end he seems to be _choosing_ Gabe, and he’s a little ashamed it took him this long to realize that.

\\\

“You’re not just a job,” Beau says, setting his keys on the table. “I figure you already know that, but. I thought I’d tell you for sure. Wolz hasn’t had you flagged as a client for a long time.”

Gabe walks past him to the kitchen for a glass of water. “I kinda figured that out when you moved in with me.”

Beau looks around, and it genuinely seems to dawn on him that yeah, short of paying rent he’s pretty much Gabe’s roommate. “Huh.”

“Well, I’m glad I’m not the only one to miss that moment.” He props himself against the wall, sipping slowly. “What next?”

There’s a pause, and Beau sighs, drops onto the couch with a thump. “You tell me, Gabe. How do you feel about an escort falling for you?”

He grins, and Beau drops his head over the back of the sofa to watch him. His expression is skeptical. “What’s so funny?”

“You called me Gabe, Beau.”

Beau stops to think about that. “I guess I did. I like it.”

“I do, too.” Gabe sits next to him carefully, hands him a full glass and watches as Beau plays with the glass for a while, chasing the chips of ice with his fingers. “Beau, I want you to make this decision, okay? This should be something you decide to do, but what do you think of actually moving in? Officially.”

“You’re okay with . . . what I do?”

“You don’t get a whole lot of choices, but you chose me. I figure that has to mean something.”

Beau fiddles with his glass, rolling it between his palms and watching the surface rock with the motion. “I haven’t . . . Not while you’re around. Wolz lets me set my schedule, pick clients and. I haven’t been working much. It’s been okay, he’s given me other stuff to do.”

“So what, Wolz runs the world’s most explicit dating service?”

Beau doesn’t immediately jump to Wolz’s defense, which makes Gabe feel better about the whole scenario. “He’s actually a pretty okay guy. We do a lot of things, sometimes it’s just the theatre or a big party. He hooked us up because he knew I missed hockey. But he doesn’t ask me to do other stuff unless I agree.”

 _I haven’t agreed for a while_.

Gabe leans over him, takes the glass out of his hand and kisses him long and deep, coaxing his mouth open and licking inside while setting the glassware out of the danger zone. Beau kisses like a _dream_ and Gabe completely misses the table, glass dropping out of his hand and sloshing onto the rug. They laugh into each other’s mouths as Gabe cradles Beau’s face in his hands.

They make it to the bed, and Beau soaks his socks when he forgets and steps into the soggy part of the rug, and they’re laughing and somewhat giddy when Gabe sucks Beau off, fucks him slow and lazy and kisses him the whole damn time, grinding into him until Beau’s so over sensitized he’s almost dazed, blinking at Gabe with the haziest, _happiest_ look he’s ever seen.

\\\

“Do you?” wanna talk about it?

“Nah.” not yet. “I mean. I made the decision to sleep with you. And I made the decision to stay with you, and he’s okay with that.”

“Yeah?” Gabe still has memories – painfully sharp to the surface memories – of Beau leaving because he was called away, of being short scheduled, and Beau tilts his head not unlike a puppy, watching him.

He picks up on it almost immediately, and normally it bothers Gabe when someone can read him so well, but for some reason when it’s Beau it just makes sense. “That was my mistake. I should have probably said no, but I wanted to see you, and . . . And you let me leave, even though you didn’t want to. I think I sorta fell hard for you then.”

As long as they’re being honest . . . “I fell for you when you came back to me.”

\\\

“I’ll be back by midnight.” Beau shrugs into his suit jacket, leans down over the weight bar and kisses Gabe, open mouthed and sloppy. “Don’t crush your pretty face while I’m gone.”

He sets the bar, rolls off the bench and towels off. “Mrs. Harrmann again?”

“ _Ms._ ,” Beau corrects immediately. “Needs someone cute and dumb at her gallery opening.”

“Well, she’ll get one of those things.” Gabe squirts himself in the face with his water bottle and Beau eyes him, too distracted by the sight to protest.

Beau still goes out sometimes, when Wolz offers him something particularly interesting. Beau’s got everything from his toothbrush to his movie collection at Gabe’s now, so it’s not like he has any reason to wonder if he’s going to come back. Beau’s been working as a host at one of the places downtown, and he’s making absent grumbling sounds about going back to DU to finish his business degree, and last month he dragged Gabe downtown to the History Museum to look at the newest exhibit. He didn’t shut up about it until they got home and Gabe pinned him to the wall and took him apart. To ‘shut him up’.

It’s strange how . . . not jealous he can be, when he knows he has all of Beau’s attention every other moment of every day now. How settled he feels.

Beau throws him a wink over his shoulder as he snags the keys to Gabe’s car out of the bowl at the door. “ _Do_ wait up, Thor.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a dork who somehow turned off my notifications for new comments; I am so sorry if there are some out there that I haven't responded to! It means the world to me when someone reads and enjoys enough to tell me so.


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